Stephen Colbert interviews Richard Dawkins

I blogged here how I think Christians should be open/welcome (to) critique and used the example of Richard Dawkin's new atheism and his critique that religion is evil. It has sparked off some deep insightful comments...

For a critique of Richard Dawkins, please do enjoy the following clip...

Comments

[John Smulo]

Stephen Colbert is great with interviews! Thanks for sharing this one.

PS How did we ever survive without You Tube?

[molly]

I was thinking that myself, John! lol...

[marc]

He still can't tell us that God doesn't exist:)

[mike]

You still can't tell us that God does exist.

[Paul]

Thanks Mike - it's an important point you make - I regard Mr Dawkins as someone who is a person of faith just as much as I am - his faith is that there is no God and my faith is that there is one - if that being true than I think as people of faith we have a lot in common to talk about...

what do you think?

[Nic k]

>Thanks Mike - it's an important point you make - I regard Mr Dawkins as someone who is a person of faith just as much as I am - his faith is that there is no God and my faith is that there is one - if that being true than I think as people of faith we have a lot in common to talk about.<

Clearly Mike hasn't read Dawkin's book ‘The God Delusion’. Specifically the bit about Bertran Russell’s orbiting tea pots.

Also, the burden of proof lies upon those making an assertion or claim. It is the theist making the claim – positing some omnipresent, omnipotent entity, micro managing the Cosmos. The burden lies on the theist to provide evidence.

Personally, I for one have seen no evidence whatsoever for such an entity. More the god hypothesis is a 'skyhook' theory; it adds nothing to our understanding of the Cosmos - that requires a 'crane' theory.

More yet; there are perfectly parsimonious, natural explanations for the god theory and why many hold to various self contradictory and mutually incompatible incarnations of it. These are mainly related to credulity, early conditioning, coercion and wishful thinking.

[Paul]

Thanks Nick, good thoughts and questions.

Whilst there are some amazing propositional rational arguements from people who lay out in a logical manner why there is a God which I find compelling ultimately we have become our own arbiters of what we chose to belief or not.

My own approach is not one of trying to prove God exists or does not exist in a scientific experiment but invite people if they are serious about the question to come and experience the life themselves. Why have the glossy sales brochure or the text book approach when it is about life practiced in a certain way.

For me and my experience I have found orientating my life around a community of faith whose common tradition stretches back 2000, following the ancient practices of gathering, prayer, denial, serving and loving others - has taught me two things

a) I can not live that life without some help from God - i am far too self focussed and king of my own life to live like that for anything but a short time - having the experience of God has changed me in many ways and the continues to challenge me; and

b) this was the same sort of life Jesus lived, in reflection of an other centred God - if he was dependent on the Holy Spirit then a christian life without that presence of God becomes a husk and i might as well pack up and go home.

So i make no claim for God other than my own experience and connection with 2000 yrs of people who have experienced God and followed him. But i do invite you to try the life for yourself and then make your own evaluation.

[Nick]

>Whilst there are some amazing propositional rational arguments from people who lay out in a logical manner why there is a God a)I can not live that life without some help from God….b) this was the same sort of life Jesus lived, in reflection of an other centred God - if he was dependent on the Holy Spirit then a christian life without that presence of God<

These are is not arguments for the existence of any deity; they are simply NOT arguments that cut to truth. They are text book examples of the consequences of belief fallacy. As to your emotional dependency on mythical entities; clearly there are millions of folks who get on just fine without belief in the Christian God Yahweh, or indeed other gods such as Allah, Zeus, Garnesh, Vishnu, Wotan, Thor …or any other of the pantheon of thousands of deities dreamt up by humanity in the last few thousand years. Indeed these arguments for an emotional crutch come over as indistinguishable in their essence from reasons put forth by those dependent on alcohol or drugs.

As for the historic Jesus – even the evidence for him is scant, outside of the Bible – which is notably self contradictory, replete with absurdities, weirdness, simply appalling morality and all too many divinely endorsed atrocities – there is pretty much only Josephus, hardly compelling and not even contemporaneous. The alleged ‘miracles’ the virgin birth, the resurrection and the paranormal tricks, are hardly unique to Christianity.

Christianity most certainly does not have a monopoly on kindship, community, humanity, empathy, fellowship, a sense of purpose, love and all of the other wholesome dynamics that are part of the human condition. Christianity in particular and theism in general are certainly not pre-requisites for these.

To me it seems as if Christianity is predicated on faith as a virtue. This soon comes back to Pascal’s wager. Dawkins deals with both comprehensively. Faith, in the religious sense, I see very much as a vice, not a virtue. It makes folks literally unreasonable.

[Nick]

>Whilst there are some amazing propositional rational arguments from people who lay out in a logical manner why there is a God So i make no claim for God other than my own experience and connection with 2000 yrs of people <

Anyway, I've not seen one 'amazing propositional rational argument', not even close.

The main arguments for the god theory are the Cosmological argument (first cause), Teleological argument (the argument from design - the 'drum' beaten by the creationist/ Intelligent designs crowd) and the Ontological argument (essentially god exists because it exists).

These are all comprehensively dealt with in Dawkins' book - The God Delusion.

There are others. Quite a few of which Dawkins deals with - quite comprehensively in my view - including the arguments from personal revelation, which you hint at. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence and personal revelation has perfectly natural explanations far more parsimonious than paranormal claims about supernatural entities.

If there are any strong theistic arguments that Dawkins doesn't deal with, I’d be interested in hearing about them.